Inspired by recent "how do I" credit threads, I went to myfico.com and paid for all three credit reporting agency reports. ~ a year ago this time I checked my credit because I was buying a house, and it was about a 495. There were a lot of inaccuracies, like several accounts I didn't recognize and have had taken off, some accounts reporting late activity incorrectly, one account showing chargeoff that was really just a 120 day late, and Providian credit company trying to charge me for their "account protection" and when I didn't pay it (thinking I had a zero balance), charging me late fees every month and then reporting a chargeoff of $155 to the credit bureaus. The Providian account I had opened in college and called to close, but since I did not get it in writing, got burned badly. They sent me a computer printout of when the charges were applied to my account and when they said I accepted the credit protection program, but the address and phone number information they have for me was incorrect. It's my word against theirs, so it's still on the reports. Even with that Providian account, My score has raised to ~655 on all three reports and should continue to go up as past negative marks fall off and I hassle Providian. So, after a year of work I have almost completely restored my credit worthiness. Yay me!
The moral of the story is, watch your credit regularly because if you don't it may be a much bigger headache down the road. The $38 I spent this year and last has saved me mucho in interest charges on the two houses I own now.
The moral of the story is, watch your credit regularly because if you don't it may be a much bigger headache down the road. The $38 I spent this year and last has saved me mucho in interest charges on the two houses I own now.
so we got a kickass rate. But I wanted to clean my sh!t up so we could both be on the mortgage next time. I mean paying off a house would really help my credit, so when we bought our second a couple of months ago my credit score didn't hurt us at all. 
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